BSkyB blocks The Pirate Bay for millions of Brits

BSkyB's broadband biz has cut off conventional access to The Pirate Bay website following a High Court order at the end of last month.

Virgin Media was the first to block www.thepiratebay.se, just days after Justice Arnold told VM, BSkyB and three other ISPs – TalkTalk, Telefonica and Everything Everywhere – to comply with the order. Everything Everywhere also blocked the file-sharing search engine.

As we reported at the time, BT was absent from the judge's list because the country's national telecoms giant had been given more time to respond.

A BT spokesman told The Register last month: "We continue to have discussions with the BPI and we hope to announce an outcome acceptable to both of us soon."

El Reg understands that BT will comply with the order within the next few weeks.

BSkyB, meanwhile, cut access to TPB for around 4 million subscribers yesterday. The company said:

We have invested billions of pounds in high-quality entertainment for our customers because we know how much our customers value it. It’s therefore important that companies like ours do what they can, alongside the government and the rest of the media and technology industries, to help protect their copyright.

Such protection makes sure that consumers continue to benefit from TV programmes, movies and music both now and in the future. This means taking effective action against online piracy and copyright infringement.

The final two ISPs ordered by the court to block The Pirate Bay – O2 (Telefonica) and TalkTalk – both have until 13 June to comply.

It was ruled in February this year that both the operators and the users of TPB are liable for infringement of the copyright of music companies. ®